TO THE CENTRAL COMMITTEE OF THE R.S.D.L.P.

Written:Written in GenevaPublished:First published in 1926 inLenin Miscellany V.

      Printed from the original.Source:Lenin
	  Collected Works,

      Progress Publishers,1971,

      Moscow,Volume 36,

      pages149-153.Translated:Andrew RothsteinTranscription\Markup:R. CymbalaPublic Domain:Lenin Internet Archive.You may freely copy, distribute,
	display and perform this work, as well as make derivative and
	commercial works. Please credit “Marxists Internet
	Archive” as your source.•README

September 15, 1905

DearComrades,

Ihave received the money, 1,000 rubles—2,640 francs—
and the first issue ofRabochy. It makes an excellent
impression. Let us hope that it will largely solve the difficult
problem of providing a popular exposition which is not
boring. There is something fresh in the tone and character
of the exposition. A splendid fighting spirit. In short, let
me congratulate you on this success with all my heart, and
wish for more. So far, I have the following minor remarks:
(1) a little more should be said aboutsocialism, in view
of the “explanatory” nature of the organ, and
(2) the
fighting political slogans should be more closely and directly
tied in with theresolutionsof the Third Congress, and with
the general spirit of our revolutionary Social-Democratic
tactics.

Nowfor your letter of Aug. 24,
1905,[2]which simply
amazed us all by its tone.
I. About information. You “can
do nothing more”. That is not true, since we find that
the Bund, and the Mensheviks, and a number of Bolsheviks
can do more, and are doing it. It is a fact that the C.C.
member abroad is not as well informed as the Bundists andIskra. This should be put right, and maintained steadily
through tireless effort. Here is the most recent example.
We received your active boycott resolutionjust the other
day.[3]People arriving from Russia have known about itsince June! And you tell us that you “can do nothing more”?
Its late arrival caused discordance between us, through
no fault of mine, for, not knowing how you wereinterpreting it, I gave a different interpretation of “active boycott”
inProletary.

Thereyou have another fact of the two-centre situation
which you have restored. In substance, the discordance turned
out not to be great, but still it is undesirable on a question
concerning the course of action of the whole Party. I believe
it to be
(1) extremely important and the only correct
approach, from the point of view of the decisions of the Third
Congress, to put forward directly, as the central point
in the agitation campaign, the slogan of insurrection and
a provisional revolutionary government.
(2) I think it is
quite wrong to advise that meetings of the electors should
be “dispersed by force”. Such tactics would be fatal. One
of the two things: either there are no conditions for using
force on a sizable scale—in which case, we should confine
ourselves to agitation, speeches, strikes and
demonstrations, making an effort at persuading the electors and on no
account “dispersing them”. Or conditions do exist for the
use of force on any considerable scale—in which case the
force must be directed, not against the electors, but against
the police and the government. In that case, undertake an
insurrection. Otherwise you risk landing in a most absurd
situation: the workers “use force to break up” meetings
of electors; the government uses force to defend them!
This in practice shows the harmfulness of not advancing
the straightforward and resolute slogan of insurrection, as
a centre of agitation against the Duma: prepare for an
insurrection, try to persuade everybody (including the electors
as well) to prepare for an insurrection, explain its
objectives, forms, methods, conditions, organs and preliminaries.
But don’t useforceto no purpose, before it has been
accumulated, for if you haven’t convinced the electors, it is
plain madness and suicide for the Social-Democrats to
scatter them by force.

Furthermore.II. You write that you were not tricking
the Organising Committee, but were doing the will of the
Third Congress. I think that you are clearly wrong in this.
I wrote to you as long ago
as...[1]about the need to prepare theconditionsfor unification, andtwo congressesto give it
effect (in the same place and at the same time, with an
obligation on the part of each organisation to accept the
decisions ofits owncongress). So there is no difference of opinion
there. But it is a fact that you have forgotten about the
secret resolution (I append it below) concerning theobligatoryendorsement of the conditions of fusion by the
Fourth Congress. That is what I have been insisting on. Two
clauses of the Organising Committee’s statement—Clauses
2 and 3—(Letuchy Listok
TsK[4]No. 3, p. 5) speak outdirectly againstunification through a congress. This cannot
be denied. But you, inyour reply, saynothing at allof
your disagreement! So the result is that you have set aside
the resolution. That this is a mistake, and that it must be
corrected, is beyond doubt.

Thenthere is another unquestionable mistake: the
absence of any direct reply to the Organising Committee.
You write that “it was a question of fusion on the basis of
the Third Congress”. Have a heart, gentlemen! Why deceive
yourselves? Why weaken your correct position by obvious
hypocrisy?

Fusionon the basis of the Third Congress was rejected.
It was offered here both by Vinter and by Vadim directly
both to Plekhanov and to the Organising Committee. Givensucha unification, there would have been asingleC.O.
(through his agents, Plekhanov even suggested a “trio”
for it). Givensucha unification, there would have been a
single C.C., formed out of both halves asan essential
condition, i.e., the “co-optation” would not have been co-optation
but a real fusion.

Butthis was rejected. Consequently, there remainsagreementup to the Fourth Congress, andfusion“on the
basis of theFourthCongress”. Instead of giving such a direct
and clear reply and statement for all to hear, you evade
the substance of the question by withholding your opinionfrom our people(for while the O.C. is patently proposing
fusionnoton the basis of the Third Congress, you reply:
this is on the whole acceptable, good, let’s have anothertalk about it!). Meanwhile you write to me: “Our ultimatum
was the Rules of the Third Congress.” And you don’t call
that self-deception? Why, if you say it in public, in the
first place, all the Bolsheviks will laugh you out of court,
and, in the second place, the Mensheviks will reply to
you insuch fashionthat all your good intentions about
fusion will go to the devil!

Inmy opinion, it is better to tell the Party frankly:
to our regret,theyhave rejected unification on the basis
of the Third Congress. Let’s set about preparing for the
Fourth Congress in such a way as to have two congresses
assemble at the same time and in the same place. Let’s
work out a plan of unification. Let’s say, in all parallel
organisationseverywherethere are equal numbers of both
groups (à laNikolayev[5]). If so, draw up a list of parallel
organisations, a complete list, and poll all of them. Then
there is a Central Committee, shall we say, also half–and–
half, i.e., in equal numbers. With completeunification,
there can be no objection in principle to “co-optation” of
that kind (though in practice the question is more
complicated and one must know how many parallel organisations
there are, etc). (In parenthesis: it’s a great pity that in No. 1
ofLetuchy Listokyou boasted that 2/3 of the Party are on
our side. Thereby you prejudiced any future acceptance
of the “half-and-half” principle on your part. And were
you really telling the truth about the 2/3?) Furthermore,
the C.O. Withfusionit would be absurd, in my opinion,
to have two Central Organs and I believe it possible that
the Bolsheviks will prefer, rather than have this absurd
situation, to have their own organ issued by several
committees, in accordance with the Party Rules. If there are tworivalCentral Organs, unification will be a dead letter. In
that event, it is better to have “agreement”, on a basis
similar to that at Nikolayev, i.e., everywhere unification
or conciliation commissions, with equal numbers from both
sides.

III.About money. We were all thunderstruck by your
statement that the C.O. must be published “on resources
from abroad”, and that the bankruptcy of the C.C. mustbegin with the C.O.You write that this is not irritation and
not a rebuke. Give me leave not to believe you. To say thiscalmly, coolly and in all seriousness is to proclaim arupturebetween the C.O. and the Party, and this is something
you could not wish. It is something unheard of to have the
Party’s C.O. published not with the Party’s resources, but
on funds abroad, and to decide that the bankruptcy of the
Party mustbegin(rather than end) with the C.O. If we
were to take this seriously, instead of regarding it merely
as a sign of nervousness on account of temporary difficulties
(for in general your turnover is a “fat” one, and your
prospects both of the 60,000 arid the “undertaking” are three
times “fatter”), we should have to take immediate steps
to start publication “on resources from abroad ” of an organ
of the Committee of the Organisation Abroad. But, I
repeat, I regard this monstrous outburst on your part only
as a state of nerves, and will await our personal meeting,
since, in my opinion, it is not the beginning of a break,
but a misunderstanding.

Bestwishes,N. Lenin

[1]Aspace was left in the MS. after “as long ago as” for the date of
the letter to the Central Committee—July 28 (see present edition, Vol. 
34, pp. 320–22). N. K. Krupskaya crossed out “as long ago as” and
wrote “earlier” over it.—Ed.

[2]TheCentral Committee’s letter of August 24 (September 6), 1905,
was signed by three members of the C.C. (A. A. Bogdanov, D. S.
Postolovsky and L. B. Krasin). It was in reply to Lenin’s Letter of
August 1 (14), 1905 (see present edition, Vol. 34, pp. 326–27).

[3]TheCentral Committee resolution, entitled “The Central
Committee on the Duma”, was published inProletary(The
Proletarian) No. 19, October 3 (September 20), 1905.

[4]LetuchyListok TsK RSDRP(Leaflet of the Central Committee of
the R.S.D.L.P.) was issued at various intervals and dealt with
current tactical and organisational questions in the light of the
decisions of the Party’s Third Congress. There were four issues
in all.

[5]Areference to the agreement between the Bolsheviks and the
Mensheviks in Nikolayev on joint political action. Both
committees appointed representatives to a commission, called “United
Organisation of Social-Democrats of the Town of Nikolayev”,
with the task of working out a plan for joint action and agitation
connected with it. To ensure the preparations for the action, the
commission set up a technical group, a funds commission, and
a combat group.

Areport from Nikolayev on this agreement was published in
the “From the Party” section ofProletaryNo. 9 of July 26 (13),
1905.